Metacritic

His new film, in Persian with English subtitles, is of a piece with his best work — tightly focused, rather than broad-gauge brilliant, and another instance of this superb filmmaker turning elusive motivations and the mysteries of personality into gripping drama.

Lacking the astounding social complexity of his Academy Award winning drama A Separation, here the gears are not so hidden and a sense of contrived drama leads to some tedious sections. But all is forgiven when the final punches are delivered in a knock-out finale that leaves the viewer tense and breathless.

Farhadi remains a master of pace and tension, slowly upping the stakes in an unsettling narrative fuelled by a lingering sense of powerlessness, paranoia and the possibility that you never entirely know the person you love.

Videos & Photos

Movie Info & Cast

Director: Asghar Farhadi

Producer: Asghar Farhadi, Alexandre Mallet-Guy, Olivier Père

Writer: Asghar Farhadi

Runtime: 2hr 4m

Synopsis

While both participating in a production of "Death of a Salesman," a teacher's wife is assaulted in her new home, which leaves him determined to find the perpetrator over his wife's traumatized objections.

Cast

Shahab Hosseini

Taraneh Alidoosti

Babak Karimi

Mina Sadati

Farid Sajjadi Hosseini

Mojtaba Pirzadeh

Shirin Aghakashi

Maral Bani Adam

Emad Emami

Sam Valipour

Did You Know?

Trivia

This is Asghar Farhadi's 4th collaboration with Taraneh Alidoosti and third with Shahab Hosseini.